Differentiation of energy concepts through speech and gesture in interaction Documents

Main Document

Through microanalysis of speech and gesture in one interaction between learners (in a course on energy for in-service teachers), we observe coherent states of conceptual differentiation of different learners. We observe that the interaction among learners across different states of differentiation is not in itself sufficient to accomplish differentiation; however, the real-time receptivity of the learners to conceptually relevant details in each other's actions suggests that future instruction that focuses explicitly on such actions and their meaning in context may assist differentiation.